After a solid start to the season, this week American Dad treats us to an absolutely insane episode, featuring Guy Fieri becoming a literal demon, some valet shenanigans and Smith family war. So grab some habanero mango queso-cheese sauce, sit back and enjoy.
The biggest knock I would have on "Flavortown" is the truly wild pacing of the episode. We start off innocently enough, as Stan criticizes Jeff during family game night. It's great to have a Jeff-centric main story this week, but the fact that he feels like a passenger throughout all of this, while intentional, doesn't really feel right. Stan wants Jeff to find a job, which he does at a pizza restaurant, and suddenly Guy Fieri is here and all hell breaks loose. Stan is a big fan of Guy, and urges Jeff to join his crew, which somehow turns into Jeff taking Guy's persona and becoming possessed by a demon, all in about ten minutes. There's some nice animation throughout this storyline, particularly when Stan reads about the history of the Eternal Fieri demon, but nothing is given the time to land or feel memorable.
Hayley's also involved in this storyline, though it really feels like her and Jeff's relationship is just one moving part too many. After spending the entire episode pushing Jeff to form a new persona, and not really caring about the consequences, Stan backs off when Hayley gets upset and decides to destroy the demon. He and Jeff travel to the literal Flavortown, which features a band of skeletons and a bunch of monkeys, because why not. When the demon gets lured to eat the afore-mentioned cheese sauce, Jeff and Stan are sent through a portal right back to the Smith house, for some reason. To cap off all the insanity, Stan tries to backtrack at the last minute, wanting to save Fieri because reasons, before going right back to being disappointed in Jeff. There is a lot of fun to be had in this storyline, but even a shred of logic or consistency would've really been appreciated.
For our B-plot of the episode, Klaus and Roger become valets. In the relatively few scenes they get, they continue to hear Steve's thoughts, though he doesn't actually appear on-screen. The twist that this storyline was all in Steve's head while he read a comic book is quite good, though the material is easily forgettable.
5/10
I get that the wild nature of this show is what makes it fun, but considering "Flavortown" sets out as a character-based episode makes it come across quite weak to me. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed watching most of the episode, but the lightning quick pace and muddled character motivations left me completely baffled by the end.
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